Angela looks for Malachy's salary at the factory gate

Angela’s attempt to collect Malachy’s wages at his Brooklyn workplace is a failed bid to protect the family’s food money from his drinking. She takes the children to the factory gate, asks whether any of his pay can be given to her, and waits for him among the departing workers. He does not appear. The next week he is dismissed and blames her visit, while the household is left to manage without the wages. The episode’s central reversal is stark: Angela can see the money being earned, but neither the workplace nor her husband makes it available to her and the children.

The wages and the walk to the gate

On the fourth Friday of Malachy’s job, Angela asks whether he will come home with his wages or spend them in bars again. He looks toward the children and shakes his head at her, as if objecting to the question being raised in front of them. She presses him about whether they will have supper or face another night of his returning late with no money. He promises to come home, but his promise does not settle the matter: the family’s access to food remains tied to a wage he controls and may not bring back.

Later that day, Angela dresses the children and sets out through the long streets of Brooklyn. The twins ride in the pram, and she sometimes lets Malachy ride when he is tired of walking. Frank is told he is too big for it, though his legs hurt from keeping pace. The children’s needs shape the journey, but Angela cannot stop to attend to every complaint; the purpose is to reach the workplace before the wages disappear into the bars.

A refusal at the factory

At the gate, Angela asks the attendant whether she can go inside to the place where the men are paid, hoping that someone might give her some of Malachy’s wages before he spends them. The attendant refuses. If the workplace made such an arrangement, he says, many wives would come asking for their husbands’ pay; as long as the men arrive sober and do their work, the employer will not intervene in their drinking. His answer draws a boundary around the wage: the workplace recognizes Malachy’s attendance and labor, but not Angela’s need to secure the income for the household.

Angela waits across the street with the children. She gives the twins water and sugar, while Frank and Malachy have to wait for food until she can get money from their father. When the half-past-five whistle sounds, men in caps and overalls pour through the gate. Angela’s eyesight is poor, and she asks the children to watch for their father. The crowd thins and then ends without Malachy appearing. She returns to the attendant to ask whether any man remains inside; he tells her that the workers are out and that he does not know how Malachy got past them. The search has failed, and the expected pay never becomes a family resource.

Food, care, and neighborhood credit

The failure at the gate does not end the children’s immediate needs. On the walk back, Angela tries bars near the station, then sends Frank to ask a barman for water and sugar for the twins’ bottles. The barman instead fills them with milk after hearing that Angela cannot pay. At home, she goes to the Italian grocery and asks for a few things on credit, explaining that her husband is late and may be working overtime. The grocer trusts her to pay later and lets her take what she needs. These encounters show two different forms of access: the workplace refuses to release a wage to her, while local people respond to the family’s need with food and credit.

After the long walk, the family eats eggs, toast, and jam, too exhausted to chew easily. The twins fall asleep after eating. Angela changes their diapers, and Frank rinses the dirty ones in the hall lavatory so they can be hung up to dry and reused the next day. Malachy helps wash the twins. Later, Frank sees Angela at the kitchen table with tea and a cigarette, crying. He imagines that when he is old enough to work he will bring home money for the food she has managed to obtain. The scene makes the costs of Malachy’s missing wages concrete: obtaining food, stretching supplies, and caring for the children continue as labor, largely carried by Angela and the children themselves.

Blame and the consequences of the attempt

The following Friday, Malachy comes home and throws his wages on the table. He tells Angela that she is satisfied now, because her waiting and complaining at the gate gave his employers an excuse to sack him. The accusation reverses responsibility: the action she took to protect the household becomes, in his account, the cause of his job loss. He takes some of the money and goes out; he returns late, singing, while the twins cry and Angela cries for a long time.

The episode does not establish whether Angela’s visit caused the dismissal; it establishes Malachy’s accusation and the job’s loss. That distinction matters. His drinking had already made the Friday wage uncertain, and the attendant had refused to help Angela protect it. After the dismissal, the family loses the income altogether, while responsibility for feeding and caring for the children remains. In this sequence, a public appeal for access to wages meets institutional refusal, then becomes a source of blame within the household. The continuing work of survival falls to Angela, the children, and the neighborly assistance that makes food and care possible.